Recent advances in the historical climatology of the tropics and subtropics

David Nash; George Adamson

doi:10.1175/BAMS-D-12-00030.1

Recent advances in the historical climatology of the tropics and subtropics

David Nash, George Adamson

University of Brighton

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

Recent years have seen major advances in our understanding of the historical climatology of tropical and subtropical areas, primarily through the analysis of documentary materials such as weather diaries, newspapers, personal correspondence, government records and ships logs. This paper presents a critical review of these advances, drawing upon examples from across the tropics and subtropics. We focus in particular on the ways in which documentary evidence has been used to improve our understanding of: (i) historical temperature variability, (ii) fluctuations in annual and seasonal precipitation, and (iii) the occurrence, severity and impact of tropical cyclones. We also discuss the ways in which documentary evidence has been combined with information from natural archives to reconstruct historical El Niño and La Niña episodes. We conclude with some suggestions for future research. These include the exploration of historical documents from hitherto under-researched regions and the application of new methodological approaches highlighted as part of the review.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	131-146
Number of pages	16
Journal	Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
Volume	95
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-12-00030.1
Publication status	Published - 1 Jan 2014

Bibliographical note

© Copyright 2014 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be “fair use” under Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Act September 2010 Page 2 or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act (17 USC §108, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the AMS’s permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form, such as on a web site or in a searchable database, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statement, requires written permission or a license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policy, available on the AMS Web site located at (http://www.ametsoc.org/) or from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or copyrights@ametsoc.org.

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David Nash
- D.J.Nashbrighton.acuk
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Cite this

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abstract = "Recent years have seen major advances in our understanding of the historical climatology of tropical and subtropical areas, primarily through the analysis of documentary materials such as weather diaries, newspapers, personal correspondence, government records and ships logs. This paper presents a critical review of these advances, drawing upon examples from across the tropics and subtropics. We focus in particular on the ways in which documentary evidence has been used to improve our understanding of: (i) historical temperature variability, (ii) fluctuations in annual and seasonal precipitation, and (iii) the occurrence, severity and impact of tropical cyclones. We also discuss the ways in which documentary evidence has been combined with information from natural archives to reconstruct historical El Ni{\~n}o and La Ni{\~n}a episodes. We conclude with some suggestions for future research. These include the exploration of historical documents from hitherto under-researched regions and the application of new methodological approaches highlighted as part of the review.",

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Recent advances in the historical climatology of the tropics and subtropics

Abstract

Bibliographical note

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